Columnist Dean Juipe: Top Rank staff tries to go about its business

Dean Juipe

Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2004 | 9:20 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4084.

Pick whatever natural-disaster imagery you like -- an earthquake, a cyclone or a hurricane will do -- and picture it having swept through the Top Rank offices while ostensibly leaving the building physically intact. Now imagine the caution the employees would be using as they return to work and resume their daily tasks.

That's pretty much the situation at the Las Vegas-based boxing promotional firm in the wake of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's sweep through its offices and the purging of its files.

It's business as usual, except business is not its usual self.

Once a magnet for those involved in the sport, Top Rank has pulled in its welcomes mats and greatly restricted the access it permits to both employees and outsiders. Its gym is no longer open to the public or media and its personnel has been warned in no uncertain terms that nothing -- not a thing -- can be said about the ongoing FBI investigation.

Yet the company and its employees are attempting to go about their business, with a minor card scheduled for Friday in Kansas City, a mid-major card scheduled for Jan. 31 in Phoenix and a major card scheduled for Feb. 28 in Las Vegas proceeding as initially planned.

Top Rank publicist Lee Samuels, reiterating that he could only be quoted as saying "we are fully cooperating with the investigation" confirmed that none of the scheduled events has been canceled or postponed.

The Kansas City card, to be televised by the Spanish-speaking network Telefutura, is unaffected, as is the card in Phoenix that features two Top Rank fighters vs. two Don King fighters to be televised by HBO, as is the Feb. 28 show at the MGM that features junior lightweights Jesus Chavez and Eric Morales in a pay-per-view offering.

"No," replied MGM publicist Scott Ghertner, when asked on Tuesday whether the hierarchy at his hotel considered getting out of its Feb. 28 deal with Top Rank. "We're proceeding as normal."

A crowd of about 7,000 is expected for that fight.

But can Top Rank continue to function as its usual well-oiled machine in the wake of the FBI probe?

Those on the periphery seem to think so.

"This isn't the first time someone in boxing has had to have press releases and attorneys speaking on their behalf," said promoter Dan Goossen, a former Top Rank vice president who now runs his own promotional firm, Goossen Tutor. "Life doesn't stop, and you have a right to go forward and that's apparently what Top Rank has chosen to do.

"You've got to go full steam ahead."

Goossen has no ill will toward Top Rank and its promoter, Bob Arum, despite the hint of acrimony that has sometimes surfaced when either of the parties discusses the other.

"I'd still like to get the best of Arum, but only in a professional sense," Goossen said. "(Having the FBI involved) is not one of the ways I'd ever look to kick a competitor's butt."

Goossen, of course, is aware that he could be asked to give a deposition or testify if the FBI moves in his direction in its pursuit of Top Rank or others within the sport.

"Whatever comes my way, I'm willing to accept it and live with it," he said. "None of us knows what's happening with the investigation, but you hope for the best in cases like this.

"I truly believe boxing is a good industry, but I'm also sure there have been some nefarious acts that have taken place within the sport."

He may be asked about those at some point.

So could Cameron Dunkin, a Las Vegas-based manager of fighters who has a number of his clients scheduled on Top Rank shows and who has often worked out of the Top Rank offices.

"None of that stuff has anything to do with me," he said, referring to what little has surfaced that pertains to the FBI's interest in Top Rank. "I don't know what Top Rank is going to do but I don't think I have anything to worry about, because all my guys are fighting and that's my only concern.

"I don't know anything" that's going on at Top Rank, he added.

Neither does anyone else, at least anyone else who's talking for the record. And those who do know a little something have been reduced to a whisper, a Top Rank employee -- Sean Gibbons -- having already been fired and those left behind both cautious and uneasy after that whirlwind of a disaster blew through.